Bill yellowish-green, the unguis dusky. Iris dark brown. Feet orange-red, the webs dusky. The upper part of the head is glossy brownish-black, the feathers margined with light brown; the sides of the head and a band over the eye are light greyish-brown, with longitudinal dusky streaks; the middle of the neck is similar, but more dusky. The general colour is blackish-brown, a little paler beneath, all the feathers margined with pale reddish-brown. The wing-coverts are greyish-dusky, with a faint tinge of green; the ends of the secondary coverts velvet-black. Primaries and their coverts blackish-brown, with the shafts brown; secondaries darker; the speculum is green, blue, violet, or amethyst purple, according to the light in which it is viewed, bounded by velvet-black, the feathers also tipped with a narrow line of white. The whole under surface of the wing, and the axillaries, white.
Length to end of tail 24 1/2 inches, to end of claws 26; extent of wings 38 1/2; bill 2 4/12 along the back; wing from flexure 11 1/2; tail 4 4/12; tarsus 1 6 1/2 /12; middle toe 2 3/12, its claw 4/12; first toe 5/12, its claw 2/12. Weight 3 lb.
Adult Female. Plate CCCII. Fig. 2.
The female, which is somewhat smaller, resembles the male in colour, but is more brown, and has the speculum of the same tints, but without the white terminal line.
Length to end of tail 22 inches, to end of wings 21 1/4, to end of claws 22; wing from flexure 10 1/2; extent of wings 34 1/4; tarsus 2, middle toe and claw 2 1/2; hind toe and claw 5/12.
In this species, the number of feathers in the tail is eighteen, although it has been represented as sixteen. In form and proportions the Dusky Duck is very closely allied to the Mallard. The following account of the digestive and respiratory organs is obtained from the examination of an adult male.
On the upper mandible are 43 lamellæ; on the lower, 85 in the upper, and 56 in the lower series. The tongue is 1 1/12 inch long, with the sides parallel and furnished with a double row of filaments, numerous small conical papillæ at the base, a median groove on the upper surface, and a thin rounded appendage, a twelfth and a half in length at the tip. The aperture of the glottis is 7 1/2/12 long, with very numerous minute papillæ behind. The œsophagus 12 inches long, of a uniform diameter of 4/12, until near the lower part of the neck, where it enlarges to 8/12, again contracts as it enters the thorax, ending in the proventriculus, which is 1 1/4 long, with numerous oblong glandules, about a twelfth in length. Gizzard obliquely elliptical, 2 1/4 inches across, 1 8/12 in length, its lateral muscles extremely large, the left 10/12 in thickness, the right 9/12; their tendons large and strong; the lower muscle moderately thick; the cuticular lining firm and rugous, the grinding surfaces nearly smooth. The intestine, which is 5 feet 7 1/2 inches long, is slender and nearly uniform in diameter, measuring 4/12 across in the duodenal portion, 3/12 in the rest of its extent; the rectum 3 1/2 inches long, dilated into a globular cloaca 1 inch in length, and of nearly the same diameter. The cæca are 6 1/4 long, 1 1/2/12 in diameter for 2 inches of their length, enlarged to 3/12 in the rest of their extent, and terminating in an obtuse extremity.
The trachea, moderately extended, is 10 inches long. Its lateral or contractor muscles are strong, and it is furnished with a pair of cleido-tracheals, and a pair of sterno-tracheals. The number of rings is 136, besides 12 united rings forming a large inferior larynx, which has a transversely oblong bony expansion, forming on the left side a bulging and rounded sac. There are 28 bronchial half rings on the right side, 26 on the left.
BARTRAMIAN SANDPIPER.
Totanus Bartramius, Temm.
PLATE CCCIII. Male and Female.